


In your arms

by DollHouseActive



Category: The Dresden Files - Jim Butcher
Genre: Comfort, Cuddles, Developing Relationship, Explicit Language, F/M, Mental Health Issues, Minor Violence, Post Skin Game, Semi-Public Sex, Winter Mantles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-06
Updated: 2017-10-28
Packaged: 2018-03-10 16:58:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 22,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3297710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DollHouseActive/pseuds/DollHouseActive
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Molly needs reassurance from Harry which turns in to Harry realizing what he has with his former apprentice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

After another long, cold, wet Chicago day fighting in the clusterfuck of supernatural mayhem I seem to always get caught in the middle of, I was looking forward to a hot shower and a long night's sleep in the relative safety and comfort of my temporary home. While not on Demonreach, that residence was with my former apprentice Molly Carpenter. After getting past the security of her apartment building, I trudged my messy way into her spacious apartment. Why did the various clusterfucks have to be messy as well as violent? I mean, really? Is it too much to ask to not ruin the few pieces of clothing I have? I sighed dramatically and headed towards the bath attached to my almost apartment like room.

Once I was in my own space, I tossed my leather duster across a chair, gingerly peeled off my t-shirt from the wounds they were stuck to and toed off my boots. The shirt, jeans and underthings would have to be burned but there was time for that after a hot shower. I cranked the hot water up as far as it would go without scalding my skin and finished stripping. Once in the shower, my battered, bruised body stung but relaxed by degrees under the hot spray. After years of frigid showers and the cold of being the Winter Knight, I relished in whatever the grasshopper, well Molly, had done to keep the hot water going despite the magical influence of two powerful practioners screwing with it. It was odd to not think of Molly as grasshopper, my young apprentice. Maybe odd wasn't the right word but putting her into that comfortable niche of unavailable was preferable to recognizing the reality of the situation. However, I have no problem physically remembering that she was indeed a grown woman with all the curves and appeal to come along with it.

With the thought of those delicious curves followed the image of her generous hips, round ass, full tits and overall fuckable body.... wait, even in my perviest masturbatory fantasies I wouldn't use those terms to describe Molly. Stupid fucking Winter mantle! Like I need help stirring up my damn neglected libido! Even with the realization that the mantle was having some effect on my thoughts, I couldn't help but dwell on the memory that had been brought to mind. Molly, when she first offered to train as an apprentice under me, fully naked, kneeling between my legs in the firelight. I groaned at the memory and decided my libido had been neglected for too long and I might as well give an inch before the Mantle took a mile. With that thought, I reached down and gripped my aching dick. My head rolled back briefly, the pleasure startling due to its recent unfamiliarity. To my dismay, the image in my mind continued to be Molly and what would have played out had I allowed it. I stroked along my shaft.... and heard a gasp that wasn't mine.

Just that quickly, the mood was gone and my will was hastily gathered together. “Who's there?”, I grated out, voice still hoarse from the yelling that had taken place in the day's conflicts. “Show yourself!” With that last command, Molly stepped out behind a veil and appeared red-faced in the bathroom with me. “Grasshopper, what the fuck?!” Normally, I probably would have handled that better and not phrased that quite so bluntly but Hell's Bells can't a guy get some damn privacy in his own rooms? I snapped off the water and glared at her. At the name Grasshopper, Molly lost some of the embarassed red to her cheeks and instead straightened her back and said, “I came to see how you were after the mess today. Karen said it was a rough fight. And my name isn't grasshopper. I'm the Winter Lady, not your apprentice.”

That last bit snagged my temper a bit and I responded a little more curtly than was called for, “Oh and checking on me required a veil... in my bathroom. Really, Molly? Be honest. You were spying on me. Did Mab put you up to this?”

Molly looked genuinely surprised at the last question and responded to that one. “No, Mab hasn't asked me to do anything regarding you. Like I would, Harry.”

“Ok, then why are you in here and why were you hiding? That's not exactly...”

Molly interrupted, “Harry, I could feel the mood you were in when you got here and came to check on you. Your mood... well, it changed while you were in the shower so I veiled myself so I could slip out and give you some privacy without interrupting or embarassing you. That obviously didn't work out as planned.” She said with a surreptious glance down my torso and them lower to where I still sported a hardon. With that reminder of my nudity and continued arousal despite the conversation, I snatched up a towel and wrapped it around my hips, more embarassed than angry now.

“Still, did you have to check on me while I was in the shower?” I mumbled testily to cover up my embarassment and try to regain some semblance of control over the conversation. And hopefully myself as well.

Molly did look somewhat sheepish, “Sorry Harry. I was just going to sit out here and talk while you were showering. I guess I just didn't really think that all the way through.”

I sighed and with that explanation my defensiveness at the situation drained. “It's ok, Molls. Just damned awkward. Let me get some clothes on and I'll fill you in on what all happened.”

 

After getting dressed in comfy sweats and my new favorite dark Spiderman tee and burning my bloody clothes in my room's fireplace, I headed out to the huge living room to talk with Molly. She had decided to make herself comfortable as well. I mean it's her apartment but her idea of comfortable made the idea of casual conversation slightly uncomfortable for me. When I entered the room, Molly was curled up on one of the spacious couches spread throughout the room wearing only a t-shirt and panties and reading a book. When she heard me come into the room, she looked up and smiled. “Hey, Harry. Come sit down and tell me how things went.”

Ok, we were playing this cool then. I walked over and sat as far away from Molly as I could without it being obvious or rude. I proceeded to fill her in on the past day's events. The goblins. The missing dog. The various faeries. A cross town motorcycle chase. The exploding cake. All of it. I focused mainly on the humorous parts of the story to lighten the mood, which wasn't difficult considering the absurdity of what had happened, and resolutely focused on Molly's face in an attempt to not let my mind wander. She was an attentive audience and laughed often through the story. When she did, I couldn't help but notice the enticing way her full breasts jiggled underneath the thin t-shirt she wore. Every time I caught myself staring, I gave myself a mental shake and refocused. Once I was done catching her up, we sat in companionable silence for a moment on the couch. Over the course of the story, Molly had gotten readjusted. Now her back was against the arm of the couch and her legs were straight out in front of her on the couch which put her feet close to me. Her head was laying on the back of the couch and she looked sleepy but... happy.

I hated to break the peaceful mood but I rose from the couch anyways. She raised her head up and asked, “You headed to bed?” "Yea, it's been a long day. Night." I started to head towards my room but as I went to turn away I caught the look on her face. She looked disappointed and lonely sitting there on the big couch by herself.

“You OK, Molls?” I asked.

“Can I ask you something, Harry?” Molly asked, avoiding my question. She looked nervous. She had sat up and placed her feet on the floor and was staring intently at them while waiting for me to answer.

“Uh, yea. I guess so.” I replied, a bit hesistantly. Molly was a very confident and capable woman so for her to be nervous about what she was asking about caught me off guard.

“Could I, uh... could I maybe sleep with you?” she asked shyly. Once the initial question was out, she realized what had been said and hurriedly followed up with an explanation. “Not like sex or anything. It's just now every time you go out, I worry that you won't come back and when you're out of my sight, I think maybe I dreamed that you came back. The only time that I actually believe you're back is when I can see you. I figure if I sleep in bed with you, I won't wake up to nightmares of you being dead and me starving in a tunnel underground and fighting for my life, training with Lea. I'm sorry I didn't mean to say all that... and oh, man I just made this really awkward. Forget I said anything. Shit, I'm going to bed.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

After the opening question, I sat there startled for a moment and with my mouth comically agape at the request. However once she got started on her rambling explanation, I pulled myself together. By the end of it, before she could turn and head to her room, I strode over to her and pulled her into a hug. This was outside our normal relationship but damned if she didn't just break my heart a little over what I had put her through. I was so busy with everything that had happened with me that i hadn't bothered to consider how that time must have been for her. I pulled her tightly to my chest and after a moment she hesitantly wrapped her arms around my lower back and leaned into me, laying her head against my chest. I just stood there for a minute and held her. She started to pull back from me so I let her.

“ Molly...” I started. Evidently that sounded too much like pity or the beginning of a denial, so she interrupted saying, “It's ok, Harry. Really, don't worry about it. Sorry about that. I'm going to bed. Just forget this, ok?”

When she turned to walk away, I grabbed her hand and pulled her back to face me. “Molly.” I started again, still holding onto her hand so she couldn't run off again. “I think it might be a good idea for both of us. I still have to reassure myself I'm not a ghost or dead or dreaming or whatever. I had no idea... I mean, I didn't think about what this must be like for you. And damn, grasshopper, I'm sorry. It's just with all the Winter urges and the bullshit impulses that seem to come along with being Winter Knight, I don't know how I would react to someone being in bed with me. I haven't tried that since the Mantle.”

Molly wasn't having any of that reason, however. She shook her head with a small smile. “Harry, do I need to remind you... again... that I'm the Winter Lady. Your mantle is tied to mine. We can figure out how that can benefit us both. I'm the one person you wouldn't have to worry about hurting. Your mantle won't let you hurt mine. So can I? Please?” After the surety of the start of that explanation, Molly looked vunerable and uncertain again about having to ask again.

Her reasoning was sound but I still had reservations. However, I couldn't deny her right then. Not after her sharing what she had been holding back and screwing up the courage to ask for what she needed. With her hand still in mine, I turned and headed to my bedroom. “Ok, Molls. We'll give this a shot. With some rules. OK?”

I looked back and saw the surprise in her eyes but she quickly nodded in answer.

“Rule one: if I get violent, whether asleep or not, you do what you need to. If that means violence or magic, so be it.” Molly opened her mouth to argue but I held up the hand that wasn't holding onto hers to stop her protest. She acquiesed and I resumed what I was saying. “Rule two: I swear I will not start anything sexual with you or take advantage of you in any way. If I start something, asleep or not, do whatever it takes to get away. Assume if I do something out of character, the Winter mantle has taken control. I couldn't live with myself if I did anything to hurt you, Molly.”

We were to my room by this point and I stopped just within the entrance to my room and let go of her hand. She looked levelly up at me and I tried to get a read on whether she was taking this seriously. “Are you sure this is where you want to sleep?” She nodded soberly and, to prove her point, headed over to the queen sized bed and pulled the covers back and slid in. She got settled in next to the wall and I noted that she seemed to know which side I preferred without asking. I also noted that on the way in to my rooms, she had evidently turned out all the lights in the apartment besides my still lit fireplace. When I hesitated, Molly patted the spot next to her.

“Come to bed, Harry.” Well, what an image that conjured. Her saying that to me while she was naked on the bed, waiting for me to take her. Her legs spread wide in invitation and her pussy wet and ready for me to thrust into and fuck her til we were both spent... Stars and stones, already? I wasn't even in bed yet and the fucking mantle was already trying to have a say. Molly quirked an eyebrow in question that I could see even in the dim firelight. I shook my head, attempting to clear it and as a silent answer to her questioning look. I sat down on the side of the bed and started to slide under the covers. Molly opened her mouth to ask something but quickly shut it. This piqued my curiousity so I asked “What is it?”

With a hint of a blush on her cheeks and her eyes looking down at the covers, she sheepishly said “I didn't think you slept with a shirt on.” Now it was my turn to quirk an eyebrow and for her to shake her head in answer. “I just want you to be comfortable.”, she offered in explanation.

“And I don't want to make you uncomfortable.” I countered. It was partially the truth, the rest of it being that one more layer of clothing was one more layer of defense (hopefully) against the base demands of Winter. With that being said I laid down, unsure of how this was supposed to go from here. Was she wanting to cuddle? To talk? Or just go to sleep? That was quickly answered when Molly scooted over as close as she could to me without actually touching me. She turned over on her side facing me and sleepily murmured, “G'night Harry.” With that, her eyes started to drift closed as apparent exhaustion allowed her to slip quickly off to sleep.

While her eyes closed, mine stayed open and looking at her now peaceful face asleep on my pillow. It was an odd sight for me. Not just because it was Molly but because there was someone else in my bed at all. I mean over the years there had been various women I had slept with but usually it was after a night of sex with someone I was in a long term relationship with. Just sleeping with someone wasn't something I did. It was oddly comforting that the first person that I just shared a bed with was Molly. And wasn't that a strange thought. Now that the thought had crossed my mind, I attempted to determine why. After all it's not like I was going to sleep any time soon. As tired as I was, the mantle was already mildly asserting itself thanks to the presence of a half naked female form in my bed. I was going to be... ahem, up for awhile. So why would Molly in my bed be a comforting thought? Arousing? Definitely. But comforting? That's not what I would have chosen as the overwhelming feeling with her in bed with me. But there it was. Maybe it was that we had been through so much together. Maybe it was due to the trust and respect that had been built up through those ordeals. Over time, I had come to see her as an equal even when I tried to resolutely pin her solely into the role of young apprentice. Molly would never be just one thing to me and this wasn't any different. She was my former apprentice, my friend, the Winter Lady to my Winter Knight. I loved her, I trusted her, I respected her. All of those together made a pretty convincing reason as to why I would enjoy her in bed with me but they didn't seem to be the primary reason. The primal, base core of me knew what I wouldn't admit: I was attracted to her and seeing her in my bed was viscerally satisfying.

Well stars and stones, now that my conscious mind had that thought it settled heavily on me and I enumerated the reasons why I was sure that wasn't true. She was too young. That wasn't particularly true. She was definitely younger than me by over a decade but there had been other age gaps similar or larger. Plus she was in her mid twenties and obviously a mature adult with the sense to know what she wanted. So there went that reason. Well, it would go against what her parents wanted but in a parent's eyes, no one was good enough for their kids. Especially in Charity's eyes. But I had known this particular family for a long time during which I had watched Molly grow and mature. That was one particular thought that was always enough to make me stop thinking about Molly in a sexual nature. OK well usually, this time it didn't seem to be working. Obviously there had been no attraction to Molly while she was growing up but now that she was grown, it was hard to not think of her as a mature adult despite the awkward teenage years that I had been around for.

At this point, that left me with very few objections left to go over but these were the ones that mattered most. Molly was an intrinsic part of my life and if things went wrong, I would be utterly lost. She was my magical complement in almost all ways. The subtlety to my overtness, the intricate to my simple, and, most recently, the Winter Lady to my Winter Knight. With her powers and mantle, there was no one else in the world who could possibly understand my life quite like Molly could. After dealing with all of it herself, she got the elation that came from magic and the exhaustion. She understood the compulsion of a Winter mantle and the fear of being changed that came along with it. All of the things I couldn't explain to any one else, I didn't have to with her. She just got it. She got me.

So with her asleep beside me and my brain too awake to do much else but consider this situation, I thought through the implications of a relationship with Molly. No one ever had to know that I had even briefly contemplated the idea of Molly and me together, I justified to myself. For once I let myself think what life would be like if I took our relationship to another level like she clearly wanted and had for some time. There would be more nights like this one: quiet companionship with someone to be comforted by in the night. A warm body to hold onto and ground me through the frequent nightmares I had found myself faced with upon returning to life. Speaking of a warm body in my bed, I would have someone who understood the Winter urges and how to quell them along with the extremely repressed desires that came with being a wizard I had besides. Again Molly would be the one person who would get both levels of that need and want with her own Winter mantle to stoke her passions as well as the sexual denial that was part of being an apprentice. Besides that Molly was undoubtably one of the most attactive women I had ever had the good fortune to meet much less enjoy spending time with. Needless to say the attraction to her was there on my part mixed in with the various other emotions that she brought out in me.

My train of thought briefly froze when Molly sleepily nuzzled over closer and got herself situated around me with an arm over my chest, her bare leg over mine and her head laying in the crook of my shoulder. I tensed not knowing how to deal with this, I didn't want to wake her and make things uncomfortable but I also didn't want her to wake up thinking I had somehow taken advantage of the situation either. However with the arrangement such as it was, it was obvious that she had adjusted herself to touch me not the other way around. So with that thought I left her as she was and just enjoyed the feel of her wrapped around me. Her long bare legs were a comforting weight across mine as was her arm across my chest. The feel of her with me under the covers in my bed and getting to look my fill of her without guilt was relaxing so I stopped overthinking things and enjoyed the moment of peace with her. I soon found myself drifting off to a rare night of dreamless sleep.

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Molly gets her request to spend the night with Harry. Now they both have to figure out what comes next in the morning after.

When I awoke a couple hours later, I went to stretch and found that my movements were hindered. Once i remembered that I was sharing the bed with someone, I also realized the sleeping arrangements had changed over the course of the night. Somehow Molly and I had ended up spooning with her as the little spoon with my arm over her side and her head using my other arm as a pillow. My hand was splayed over her bare stomach since her shirt had evidently ridden up (or I had pushed it up) and was resting barely under the lower swell of her breasts. I was effectively pinned and while normally I wouldn't have minded, it seemed my body had reacted to the curves of her pressed tightly against me and I was unable to move away without waking her and having a very awkward discussion as to why I wouldn't stand up. I pulled my arm away from her side but the rest of my body must have tensed as well because Molly started stirring awake. She rolled over from her side to her back with my arm still under her and looked blearily at me. “Harry?” she mumbled, still half asleep. “Why are you up?”

At that particular phrasing, I felt my face redden slightly before realizing that she meant awake not, well, up. “I don't know, Molls. Just felt like time to get up.” She made a sound of protest, grabbed my recently freed arm and rolled back to her side. This put us back to where we were when I woke. “Molly, what are you doing?” I asked cautiously. “Mmmm stay. Cuddle.” she murmured, snuggling deeper under the covers and even closer to me.

This had the maddening effect of rubbing her barely covered ass against my already aroused body. Evidently this registered through the sleepy haze she had been operating in. Her blue eyes snapped open in surprise at the erection she could feel pressing against her. However, instead of doing what I expected and rolling away and stammering something in apology, she smirked and experimentally pushed her hips against me again. The stimulation was more than I had had in years at this point with another person. I barely suppressed a groan at the amazing sensation but my arm tensed reflexively around her, partly in response and part in warning.

 

“Molly...” I said in warning.

 

“Mmm?” she half hummed the question. She knew what she was doing but took the warning my tone had offered. She pushed herself up a little breaking the hold I had on her and turned over in my arms situating herself with her head laying on my arm and her face pressed into my chest under nestled under my chin. Well, she was a cuddler in the morning evidently. It was kind of adorable.

 

“Morning, Harry.” she said after she got herself adjusted to her liking. I could hear the smile in her voice and I could only guess at what was going through her mind.

 

“Morning, Molls,” I replied warily, nervous to see where this was going. This was new territory for me and I wasn't comfortable with the feeling of not knowing how to proceed with someone I knew so well. Usually when I woke up next to someone, there was a pre-established sexual relationship and I could always fall back into that when conversation failed me.

 

“Whatcha got going on today?” she inquired.

 

OK that wasn't where I expected this conversation to go but idle chitchat worked just fine for me. I proceeded to tell her the gist of what I anticipated my day to be like. Nothing interesting planned but hey, she asked. Some small work cases, a few loose ends Mab wanted me to follow up with but mostly everyday errands.

 

I summed it all up with a wry smile by saying, “But hey when do things ever go as planned for me? Who knows what will actually happen.” She must have felt the wry smile because she raised her head and returned it.

 

“That's very true. I just have to deal with some court stuff today. Nothing fun.” This piqued my interest. Usually she didn't bring up Winter business to me outside of actual court and having to deliver messages from Mab. That either meant something was really bad or she was trying to open up about her side of these set of responsibilities.

 

“Really? Anything I can help with?” I inquired to see which direction the conversation was heading in. If it wasn't something that required the Knights help, then I would just let her talk it over as her plans for the day and leave it at that.

 

She shook her head, saying “No, it's just some political niceties that have to be observed with the noble Sidhe. Then solving a couple of disputes with the subjects of Winter. Basically, Mab wants me to learn the court side of things in addition to learning how to deal with the new powers. We both know better than to throw you into anything where diplomacy is involved.” She finished her explanation up with a sarcastic smirk to let me know she was kidding with that last statement. I feigned insult with an affronted gasp and widened eyes to which she responded with a giggle.

 

“Well, to show off my frankly superb diplomatic skills I suggest a peace offering in the form of breakfast in the face of your ridiculous jibe at my character. Your options are cereal or eggs and toast for said peace offering.” I said all this while keeping the joke going that I was insulted by her statement. I needed a way to put this back on more familiar ground and when we were both home, we often sat and ate breakfast together. She seemed to get that I was looking to step back from the situation a little bit and I could see her enthusiasm dim slightly. Her empathetic nature picked up on subtle cues from me and I didn't like that my issues had the power to hurt her but she maintained a now slightly forced smile. "Sure Harry. Cereal sounds great. "

 

I went out to the kitchen and poured both bowls of cereal. Thankfully, we both had the appetites of 5 year olds when it came to cereal so Lucky Charms were a perfectly acceptable choice to go with the cups of coffee for both of us. I poured sugar in both of our cups and waited for her to come join me. Within a few minutes, Molly came out in a simple but stunning outfit of a black pencil skirt and blue silk blouse with black pumps. Her blonde hair was straight but gorgeous and her face needed zero help from any cosmetics to be beautiful. Gone was the warm, friendly and half naked Molly with bedhead and a teasing grin that I woke up to and in her place was the Winter Lady with all her shields up. I was slightly taken aback by the 180 change that had occurred in the few minutes she was away from me.

 

“Hey there, Molls. You look nice. Breakfast is ready.” I offered, somewhat hesitantly. Molly very rarely seemed this distant.

 

“Thanks. Actually I'll just take the coffee with me. I'm needed sooner than expected.” Her response was formal in the face of my casual greeting. I didn't know whether I was more confused or concerned at the moment.

 

“Umm, ok. Well, guess I'll see you tonight then. Be safe.” All I got in response was a brief nod as she gathered up her coffee in a thermos and her keys and headed out the door. Well this had been a whirlwind morning. I definitely had a lot to think about before I saw her again tonight.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey there!
> 
> This is my first time ever attempting to put anything out there for someone to read. Constructive criticism is welcome! I want to know what I can do to get better. Also things are probably going to start deviating more from the story line. They'll get around to having some fun at some point though. :)


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry gets to see a whole new side of Molly and it provides the opening he had been looking for.

When I got back home later that evening, I headed straight for the shower. The novelty of hot water still had not worn off so every chance I had, I indulged. The day had went relatively smoothly. Or as smooth as a day could go for me. Thankfully nothing too extreme had happened because I spent most of the day preoccupied by the situation with Molly and what last night might have changed. They way things had ended when she left had left a bitter taste in my mouth and I was pretty sure I had hurt her feelings by distancing myself.

While finishing up the shower, I decided to try and make it up to her tonight. The least I could do was try and attempt to make dinner for us before she got home so that there would be an opportunity to talk to her and maybe smooth things back to how they were before. As I was getting out of the shower, I heard the apartment's front door close. Well, there went the surprise dinner plan.

I got out of the shower, dried myself off and had the towel wrapped around my waist on my way to get clothes by the time that Molly strode in to my room, effectively scaring the hell out of me.

“Molly, what are you...” That's about as much as I got out before Molly stopped in front of me and pushed my shoulders back against the wall.

I tried asking again and got about as far as before when she reached up, grabbed a handful of hair and forcefully brought my face down to hers. She took my mouth in a hard kiss that was more about aggression than about any sort of passion. I was still confused by the abrupt entrance that I could only think to push her back after a second or two. Molly resisted so I added a bit more pressure when pushing her away.

“Molly, what the hell?!” My voice may have went up a bit when asking this but hey, really who could blame me for being surprised? She seemed to be making a habit of catching me with my pants down, metaphorically speaking. My hands were still on her shoulders holding her back and I caught a feral look in her eyes that worried me. What was worse was the cold glint in her eyes that made her look miles away from my Molly.

Instead of responding to my question, she snarled and tried to push back towards me. I resisted and kept her away from me. This obviously did not sit well with her because in a move that caught me completely unaware, Molly grabbed both of my wrists from where they were being used to hold her away and pushed them up and back to the wall with more strength than I would have expected. While I was still registering this unforeseen turn of events, another fact registered: her hands were freezing. Wait no, she was using her hands to freeze ice manacles to hold both of my hands pressed back against the wall where she had pinned them.

Don't get me wrong, I could overpower Molly but she had caught me completely off guard so I didn't start fighting back until after my hands were pinned and frozen to the wall. Once she had me there, she pressed the length of her body against mine and leaned towards me with her hands on either side of my head. With the pumps she had been wearing from this morning, it didn't take much to put her face almost level with mine. She stared at me for a second and let it sink in that I was where she wanted me.

“My Knight,” she started off in a voice that was cold, angry and a bit dangerous but nowhere near the voice that I expected out Molly. “You have put this off long enough. Tonight you will serve your Winter Lady.”

I stared blankly at her and asked, “Huh?” Eloquent, that's me. The question wasn't really directed at Molly because it was apparent that Molly wasn't in control right now. I was pretty sure I was dealing with the Winter Lady and I had no idea how this was going to play out. I needed to get through to Molly but without knowing what caused the change in her, there was little I could do to try and talk her out of it. I knew from experience that any number of strong and violent emotions can trigger the rush of emotions and desires that come from Winter's power. Things like lust, anger, violence, and fear brought out all of the negatives that came with being involved with Winter and amplified them. I could only figure that Molly's would be similar.

“You have done nothing but frustrate and hurt this girl in your own selfish pursuits. You have ignored her needs and therefore neglected your Winter Lady. Tonight, you will serve her as she sees fit. All of the things that you have denied her, you will acquiesce now.” The Winter Lady said all of this with utter surety. To her, this was a given and I was to do as I was told. That assumption pissed me off.

“If Molly wants to say something about how I treat her, she can damn well tell me herself. You're seriously playing messenger? To do what, make sure she gets some? That's kind of pathetic.” I was trying to goad the Winter Lady into a response that would give me more insight into what set this off and boy, did I succeed. Not in getting more insight but I definitely got a response.

The Winter Lady made something akin to a hissing noise before backhanding me across the face. I turned my head back to where I could face her again and once I had done so, she grabbed me by the hair and forced my face back closer to hers. She looked into my eyes and I saw nothing of Molly there. I didn't feel bad for saying these things if it meant that it would piss Molly off enough to take back control and confront me about them. Instead, it had the opposite reaction and the Winter Lady appeared to have taken complete control with the rise of Molly's emotions.

“You will watch your tone and show her and I the respect we deserve. If you will not willingly give me what is my due, then I will take it.”

I wasn't quite sure what she meant until she again smashed her lips to mine. Passion and desire were not factors in this meeting of lips: this was a show of dominance, plain and simple. She had tried to give me no choice but to accept that she was in control here. To prove otherwise, I utilized the only weapon currently at my disposal and bit her lip hard enough to draw blood. This did nothing to deter her and, in fact, seemed to further spur her on to prove that she was in charge.

During all of this, I had been working on trying to free my hands but it seemed they wouldn't budge and the power from Winter was proving ineffective against combating my bonds and it was too close to skin to use fire. Upon realizing that I couldn't get free and that the violence I could offer in answer to her assault would only serve to make her more determined, I relaxed against her and submitted to her kiss. This seem to satisfy the urge she had to assert her dominance as she pulled back with a little hum of approval.

“Ah, it looks like my Knight has seen the way that things should be. Am I correct in assuming that you now understand that you are here to serve me?”

Though it took a bit of control on my part, I answered her as convincingly as I could, “Yes, my Lady.” I hoped I wasn't overplaying the subservient Knight thing but this was so far out of character for me, that I could only guess as to how this exchange should happen.

Now that she thought she had won this battle, the aggressive side of her seemed to tame a bit but was replaced with something I had more trouble coping with: the alluring, seductive cold side of Winter. The raw sexual energy that began to surround the Winter Lady was much harder to combat than the violence she had previously offered. The hand on my hair gentled and her other hand wandered to my bare chest. The body that had been used to cage me against the wall before became more pliant and melted against me. It may have been the Winter Lady standing in front of me but it was all still wrapped up in the delectable body of Molly Carpenter. My libido was not immune and was far too neglected to put up much of a fight.

However, more than anything I was feeling at the moment, I knew that after coming to some sort of acceptance of my feelings towards Molly that this was not how I wanted our first time together to be. She would still remember all of this even though she wasn't in control and would not handle it well if she felt she had forced me into this. Therefore, my priority was to draw Molly back out and try and go from there. In order to do that, I needed to calm down the emotions that were associated with Winter and try to draw out others that would hopefully serve to give Molly something to grab onto.

With that goal in mind, I kept my eyes on hers as I lowered my mouth to hers in a kiss that was a far contrast to the brutal battle of mouths that occurred moments earlier. I brushed my lips against hers and darted my tongue out to brush at the wound I had inflicted on her earlier. I pressed my lips there as a way to silently apologize for the damage. Obviously, I had no regrets about hurting the Winter Lady while she was trying to force me into submission but I didn't like the fact that I had put a mark on Molly.

The Winter Lady was still draped across every available inch of my body and allowed me to try and please her and accepted it all as her due. So I took the kiss deeper and licked at the seam of her lips until she allowed me entry and I was able to taste the delicious frozen berry flavor that was unique to her. The touch of cold that her mouth offered against mine was a delicious contrast to the heat that was starting to build in me. I brushed at her tongue with my own and teasingly encouraged her to kiss me back. Once I felt her start to take some initiative in the kiss, I figured that maybe the lazy and playful kiss would be a way to warm her up a bit and dull some of the fiercer emotions she may have been feeling. When I retreated a bit and pulled back slightly, her hand tightened briefly in warning on my hair and she raised up a bit to make up the distance. I inched back a little more and whispered against her lips, “Molls?”

She backed away a tiny bit and her body stiffened slightly. Those eyes were still cold and distant but they were starting to look more familiar. I pressed a bit more in trying to draw her out.

“Can you free my hands, grasshopper? I have some other places I would rather them be than above my head.” I tried to tease her a bit and hoped that it wouldn't serve to fuel more anger by using the name I had called her while acting as her mentor.

“Excuse you?” The Winter Lady said a bit testily. “How dare you address me so familiarly? You are here to serve me and will do only what I allow you to do.”

“Aww, come on Molls. I want to see if you still have some of those metal bars.” I responded with a wicked grin. She looked affronted by this suggestion but a hint of a blush was showing on her face and that gave me some encouragement to push on more.

“Seriously, last time I saw them was years ago and you were entirely too young. I still remember some of the more interesting ones. I want to see if they're still there. If they are, well, I would really like to get my hands on all of the places where I remember those bars being.”

The blush got a bit stronger and some of the ice faded from her eyes. I almost had her back now. I just needed to push a bit harder and hopefully make up for the harsh words I had said earlier in the hopes of goading her.

“Think you could let my hands loose so that I can get them on those amazing breasts of yours? Or maybe on that tight ass? Would you like that, Molls?”

With that last statement, the last traces of the Winter Lady left and in her place was a horrified Molly Carpenter. “Harry? Oh my god!” With that declaration, she pushed back away from me and stared for a moment in disbelief at the situation. Her gaze took in my current state from top to bottom. I could only picture what she had to be seeing. My hands pinned to the wall with icy cuffs. My hair in disarray from the handfuls she had grabbed. The trace of blood on my mouth from the kiss while her lip was cut. When her gaze drifted further down, the blush I had coaxed out before got several shades deeper and I felt one grow in response. I was still wearing only a towel and that wasn't enough to cover my response to what we had been doing and the images my words had brought to mind.

But then a thought occurred to me, I wanted to take this further and see what happened. I felt a grin creep across my face and told her, “Take these cuffs off and let's pick up where we left off.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I kind of lost my drive to write for a bit and got stuck on where to take this but Harry and Molly know where they want to go after this. ;) 
> 
> Comments and suggestions are always welcome!


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry realizes what he wants and finally makes Molly aware of it as well. AKA finally Molly gets a bit of what she wants!

“Harry, oh my god. I'm so sorry! Here.” With that, she quickly released the bond on my hands and turned away, apparently trying to gather herself. Once my wrists were freed, I rubbed at them a little to get some of the circulation back. My hands being raised up had made them go kind of numb but the cold didn't really bother me... I might have chuckled internally at the pop culture reference. Elsa, that's me. Stupid catchy song. Anyways... now I had to figure out how to go from here with Molly. I obviously wanted to take things further with her physically but I needed to find out what had set her off. With that in mind, I walked over to where she was standing with her back towards me and her arms hugging her torso and put a hand on her shoulder to try and urge her to face me again. When my hand touched her, I felt her flinch a bit. Oh no, we weren't having any of that. We had made some sort of progress with this and we weren't taking a step backwards.

I removed my hand from her shoulder but went to face her. “Molly? You wanna talk about what happened here?”

She kept her eyes downcast and responded with a mumbled, “I'm sorry Harry.”

“OK then I'll start. First thing, I'm not upset at you for this.” Molly looked up, startled. I continued, “You know I understand sometimes when the mantle takes over, there's no good way to take control back. I know what it's like to regret what you did under the mantles influence and I also know that it's almost inevitable that we're going to slip up sometimes. We're still only human... mostly. I think?” She smiled a little at that.

“Second, we need to have a talk about what caused this. Evidently it was something related to me but we need to clear the air about what happened before we can move forward.” She arched an eyebrow at that comment. “We'll talk about that after we settle this.”

She huffed out a sigh. “Can we go sit down and get something to drink first?”

I looked down at my current state of undress and her formal clothes. “We should probably change first.” She nodded in agreement and left me to get dressed and went to change her clothes. I changed into sweats and a comfy t-shirt and when Molly came out, I saw that she had similar thoughts of comfort in mind with an almost identical outfit to mine. Once that was done, we walked into the kitchen and both grabbed one of Mac's beers then headed to the living room to sit down on the couch similar to how we started out the night before. I took a drink of my beer and waited for her to start talking.

She had situated herself on the couch with her legs tucked beneath her and was sipping from her beer pensively. She kept her eyes facing forward and away from me as she started talking.

“It was a rough day at court today. The Sidhe were making their usual power plays but Mab evidently didn't like the way that I handled things. She made her displeasure known after court had adjourned.” I hissed in a breath and looked her from top to bottom to see if anything was out of place.

“Molly, are you ok? Did she hurt you?” I inquired softly.

“I'm fine, Harry. It was more of a mental ordeal than a physical one but I got through it. But all of that took a lot out of me and as I was heading home, I kept thinking about this morning to get my mind off of Winter. It started to get to me the more I thought about it and I got so worked up that before I knew it, I was here and confronting you.” She attempted to leave it at that but that explanation wasn't good enough for me. I needed to know her thoughts on the matter and to do that, I was going to have to pry a bit.

“What about it upset you? If I don't know, I can't keep myself from doing it again. I don't want to hurt you Molls if I can avoid it.”

“Harry, do we really have to do this? It's done. I'm sorry about what just happened but can we just not have this talk?” She asked, somewhat wearily.

“It needs to be said. Look, I'm glad you came to me last night with some way to help you out. I liked being able to make you feel a little better. But I didn't know how to deal with this morning. It's new ground for me and I'm probably going to fuck up again but I can do better if you tell me what's wrong.”

“What do you mean 'fuck up again'? I thought that was a one time thing. Or would be after this morning and what happened tonight.” She seemed genuinely puzzled by what I had said.

“Molly, if last night helped you at all then I want to keep doing that. I enjoyed it too, you know.” I hoped that the admission would gain me some ground on her saying what needed to be said.

“Really?” she asked with the faintest touch of hope in her eyes and voice.

“Yes. Now can you answer my question please?” I pushed just a bit more. If she could be honest about what was going on here, then maybe we could try and see what developed between us.

She looked back down at the ground, took another sip of beer and told me what was wrong.

“I'm pretty sure you know, and have known, that I have feelings for you. I can't help that but they weren't why I asked for you to stay with me last night. I genuinely wanted you there to know that you were alive and well and close by.”

“But this morning when I woke up, that reassurance wasn't what I was looking for. Waking up in your arms was... I don't know. It was nice. I wasn't trying to push for any more than that. It just felt normal to stay cuddled up with you in bed and talk for awhile. For a minute, it was almost like you felt the same way.” she said. There was just a touch of wistfulness in her voice at that thought.

“Then, of course, you take your customary step back because heaven forbid that you should try and get close to someone.” She finished off, a little vehemently at the end. I smiled at that.

She finally looked back up at me and glared at the smile on my face.

“Sorry." I hastily apologized. "It's just that you're right. That's exactly what I did. I took a step back because it's what I do when it comes to you. Every time, my thoughts start turning towards being with you in any sort of way besides friends or student and mentor, I've given myself a mental slap on the hand for thinking like that.”

“But...” she started to interrupt a bit indignantly.

“But I've thought about it,” I continued over her protest “and figured out that the reasons I was giving myself to stay away from you were excuses. I was trying to justify why this wouldn't work, instead of looking at how it might. Last night forced me to reevaluate. We're both adults and we can try to proceed with that thought in mind.”

Molly stared at me, mouth a little agape. I take it that was not what she was expecting. I may have smirked a little. I liked keeping her off guard.

“Having said that, the Winter Lady kind of took our chance at a first kiss away but I'd like to give that another try. If you want to that is?” I said, with a hint of a grin. I was almost sure of what her answer would be but I'd had a lot of time to think about this and I knew how I wanted this to go. She nodded after a second, still too stunned to speak.

“Good. Stand up and come here.” She did so. “Straddle my lap and put your hands on my shoulders.” Molly got a bit wide eyed at that command but, after a second's hesitation, obeyed. Once she got situated, I took a second to enjoy her strong legs on either side of my hips, her warm hands placed lightly on my shoulder and the up close view that this afforded me of her chest and face. She looked a little nervous so I smiled up at her. She shyly returned the smile and I took that as a sign she was ok to move forward. I reached my hand around to smooth up her back, skim over her neck before resting my fingers in her hair. I placed the barest hint of pressure to encourage her to lean forward and I met her halfway, our eyes staying locked until our lips met.

My eyes slid closed and I focused on the kiss. At first, it was the barest brush of my lips across hers. Then I sucked on her bottom lip lightly to avoid hurting the cut I had caused earlier. During all of this, she let me take the lead and I kept my hand wrapped in her hair and idly massaged my fingers against her scalp. I traced my tongue across her lips, tasting Molly this time and not the Winter Lady. It was different and I loved it. Molly tasted more down to earth, like the beer we had both been drinking and the subtle sweet flavor that was all her.

Molly's own tongue slipped out to entangle with mine, shyly at first then with more heat. I groaned against her mouth when she sucked on my tongue like she would on some much more interesting parts of my anatomy. The kiss already had me aroused but that one move had me so turned on that the kiss went from exploratory to frantic in no time flat. I removed my hand from her hair and instead used them both to grip her hips and grind her down onto my hard cock. She moaned at the contact to her sex and rubbed against me in a way that let me know she was just as turned on as I was. Her hands had been gripping my shoulders but had moved to wrap around my neck and tangle into my hair to keep me close to her. The heated kiss continued for a little longer but I knew I had to ease back a bit. As much as I would love to, and God did I want to, I didn't want to rush into everything all at once.

So I slowed things down and pulled my mouth away from hers. She made a little sound of protest at me ending the kiss and kept her hands in my hair but I just laid my forehead against hers for a second while we both caught our breath. I kept my eyes closed for a second but when I opened them, I groaned just a little. Damn, she was sexy like this, with her eyes closed and her already full lips swollen from kissing and generous breasts rising and falling with her slight pants as she caught her breath and tried to regain control of herself. When she opened her eyes, I could barely see the beautiful blue because her pupils were so dilated. I was more than a little proud of myself for having that effect on her.

“So, that was a lot better than the first one.” I said wryly, to lead into the conversation that I hoped would spell out how we could proceed from here. One side of her mouth quirked up.

“Yea, that was much better. I didn't end up bleeding this time either, you savage.” She said this jokingly and I was glad that she had accepted what I had said about the incident and try to make light of what happened. I laughed. My hands were still on her hips so I gave them a friendly squeeze at the jibe. “Seriously though, what do we do from here?” she asked.

I could tell that she was worried I would pull my usual habit of trying to put us back on normal terms again. I didn't like that I had made her scared that any time I gave her a little of what she wanted that I would immediately pull back away and pretend it hadn't happened. I felt like an asshole for doing that to her. As a kind of reassurance, I placed my lips on hers in a soft kiss and pulled back to answer.

“Now, we go to bed and cuddle.” I answered her. I knew that wasn't what she meant and she let me know it.

“Harry, you know what I mean.” she told me sternly.

“I know. Well, as much as I would love to take you to bed and release a lot of pent up frustration for both of us, I like you too much to do that.” She arched an eyebrow in question at that. I chuckled.

“I know that sounds backwards but I really do like you too much for you to be a casual fuck. I want to do this right. So, Molly Carpenter, would you like to go out on a date with me?”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As much as I wanted this to be smut when I started out, it turns out that what I really wanted was for my two favorite characters to finally get a chance to be happy together... which will eventually lead to smut! ;)


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry finally makes some progress and Molly is suspicious. (aka I'm bad at summaries :P)

Molly sat very still and gave me a wary and slightly bewildered look as though I had just asked her to go streaking or something equally as ridiculous. She looked so stunned that it was comical and I laughed a bit at her reaction. That got her back to the conversation at hand because if there was one thing Molly Carpenter couldn't stand, it was being laughed at. Her look turned into a glare and she made a move to get up off my lap and away from me but I had no intentions of letting her off the hook that easily so I linked my fingers at the small of her back so that it would be more difficult to get away from me.

“You're making fun of me and I don't appreciate it. That's not funny.” She tried to get up again but I caught on to what she thought I was laughing at and I got a little pissed at her assumption.

“Do you really think I'm the kind of asshole that would ask you on a date as a joke? I was laughing at the look on your face but not at you or the situation. Come on Molly, you know me better than that.” I said managing to keep most of the anger and affront out of my voice. She calmed and stopped trying to get up and looked rather abashed once she heard my explanation.

“You're right. Sorry, this all just seems a little too much like what I want so I assumed that there's a catch. But if you're serious, then yea I would like that.” She smiled a little to take the edge off any blame that might be misconstrued from her words. I smiled back to let her know I didn't take it personally.

“Well, now that that's settled, are you ready for bed Miss Carpenter?” I asked with a hint of a wolfish grin on my face. I couldn't help it, this might all be new but it was definitely going to be fun. Molly's eyes had widened in surprise at that phrasing. To further surprise her, I figured that my Winter mantle should come in handy for something fun for once so I scooted forward on the couch with her still in my lap and locked my hands under that really spectacular ass and stood up still holding her. She caught on quick and wrapped her arms around my neck and her legs around my waist. Seriously, the grin on my face couldn't be contained. This really was fun and it looked like Molly didn't mind it too much either. Her look reflected equal enjoyment at the situation and she took advantage of my full hands by trying to distract me while I walked us to my bedroom. She was doing a wonderful job of it too by running kisses and licks over my neck and rolling her hips towards me in a lazy seductive roll.

Once I got to the bedroom, I sat her down on the bed and followed her down. I still had every intention of taking it slow but I could drive us both crazy in the meantime. Her head ended up on my pillow with her stretched out on my bed and then I was over her with her legs on either side of me. If only there weren't so many clothes in the way... nope, dammit Harry, willpower. For the time being, I could restrain myself to necking like a couple of teenagers. We could build up from there. And stars and stones, would there be an explosion when this particular build up finally got released. However, I allowed myself one small step forward and asked after a couple minutes of feverish kissing, “Hey Molls? Remember how you said you wanted us to sleep in what we were comfortable in? How about we go ahead and get comfortable before we go to sleep?”

She clearly saw where I was going with this and had a wicked gleam in her eyes that said she most definitely approved. I kneeled up between her legs and scooted back a bit so her legs had more room then I just took a second and appreciated what was going on here. I had one of the few women I had ever allowed myself to care for in my bed and she looked damned good in it too. Molly's hair was tousled from my hands being in it, her eyes were gleaming, her cheeks were flushed and her lips swollen from the kissing we had been doing. I enjoyed the view for another few seconds and then I ran my hands up her legs over the sweats that she wore until I reached the waist band. I glanced up at her face for a second to make sure she was ok with this but she just bit her lip, planted her feet on the bed and raised her hips up a bit to allow me to slowly draw her pants down her legs. She set her hips back down and I allowed my hands to run over the smooth, strong muscles of her thighs then her calves just savoring the feel of her against me. I pulled her pants all the way off and tossed them to the side leaving her in only black underwear and her t-shirt. I went to take my shirt off so I could get back to kissing her some more and driving us both crazy.

Molly had other ideas. She sat up and said with a wicked, teasing glint in her eyes, “Nope. My turn. I didn't even have to buy you dinner first” I dropped my hands back down and chuckled at the reminder. She reached up for the bottom of my shirt and, tortuously slow, drew my shirt and her hands up the length of my chest. Her cold hands felt sublime in contrast to my heated skin. She got my shirt over my head and tossed it to join her pants. Where I had stopped with my hands on her exposed skin, Molly took it a step further and started pressing random kisses over my chest while stroking over my back.

“Molly...” I started to say in warning. She was having none of that though. Instead of stopping, she glanced up at me impishly and lightly bit me. I groaned at that. So instead of warning her again, I quickly reached down and grabbed both of her wrists and proceeded to pin her to the bed. She grinned in the split second before my mouth covered hers again. This time, there were no gentle, teasing kisses. These were hungry, intimate preludes to sex. It was all pressing lips, thrusting and stroking tongues and gently biting teeth. I kept her hands pinned beside her head and I could feel the steady roll of her hips pressing up to mine. I briefly gave in and allowed myself to thrust forward to meet that delicious heat against the front of my sweats to my aching cock beneath them. When I realized that this was quickly heading out of control, I forced myself to pin her hips to the bed with mine and tear my mouth away so I could bury my face in the side of her neck. I pressed a few heated kisses there as well but started to pull myself back together.

“Harry?” Molly asked.

“We have to stop here for the night. Gimme a sec.” I managed to pull myself back together enough to raise my head and smile down at her. “We should go to sleep. That ok with you?”

She looked at me in that way that said that was not what she had in mind but she replied with “Sure.” I rolled over to my side of the bed and stared up at the ceiling “Distract me for a minute. Please? What are you doing tomorrow?”

She cast me a sidelong glance from where she was still sprawled on the other side of the bed but obligingly answered. After a few minutes of mindless conversation to help me get myself back under control, I looked over at her again and there was a pause in the conversation. Molly was stretched out on her side of the bed and had been staring at the ceiling as well throughout our conversation and trying to give me some privacy while I composed myself. I took a second to take in her profile. She really was gorgeous and now I didn't have to wonder about what to do in this situation like I had the night before. Now I could have her wrapped around me and have the closeness I craved but so often went without so I took advantage of the situation at hand. “Come here, Molls.”

She looked over at me, a little startled but moved closer with very little hesitation. I turned on my side and had her wrapped in my arms with her legs entangled with mine. Her head was laying on my shoulder and she tilted her head up to look at me once we were situated to my liking. I took that opportunity to kiss her softly one last time then said, “Night.” There was a small, almost content half smile on her face when she returned the kiss and answered, “Night, Harry.” She snuggled back down into my arms and quickly fell asleep. I kissed her forehead one last time and thought how much better this was than most nights of my life had been then drifted off to sleep.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the style of Jim Butcher, Harry gets a little bit of happiness... surely nothing is going to go wrong. Please feel free to leave suggestions or criticism. Thanks! :)


	7. First Date

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things get a little steamy on Molly and Harry's first date.

The following morning, I had a much better handle on how to deal with waking up to a gorgeous half naked woman in my bed. I still woke up before she did but this time there was no trying to disentangle myself from her so I lay there for a few minutes with my arms wrapped around Molly and idly stroking my hand up and down her back simply because I could. She stirred awake slowly and I let her, not wanting to break this rare peaceful slice of normalcy that so many people took for granted. Once she was partly awake, she looked up at me with a sleepy smile and mumbled, “G'morning.”

That smile was so endearing that I returned it and leaned down and kissed her forehead before I told her good morning as well. Evidently that wasn't a sufficient response because she pushed herself up slightly and placed a series of soft kisses on my lips before settling back down and nuzzling back into my arms. Yep, definitely a cuddler in the mornings. Since she seemed to be more awake, I asked her the question that had been on my mind since I woke up.

“Do you have plans tonight?”

She thought to herself for a second before replying, “No. Why?”

“Ok good. Don't make any.”

The rest of the morning ran through like the previous one should have. We each went, showered and got dressed for our respective days then reconvened in the kitchen and made small talk over breakfast. There was a brief comfortable lull in the conversation where we each finished off our bowls of cereal and sipped on our coffee.

Molly broke the silence by looking up at me over the rim of her coffee mug and slyly asking, “So... what have you got planned for us tonight?”

“Pssht, I'm not telling you. You get to show up and enjoy the pleasure of my company. Anything else is a bonus obviously,” I joked as a deflection. To be honest, I was as nervous for this first date with Molly as I had been for my first date ever. I just didn't want to screw this up already. She elbowed me in the ribs in mock offense and then let out a soft snort of laughter. I grinned in response.

“Can you try and meet me here around 8? Casual clothes, nothing fancy.” I asked her.

“Ooooook,” she drew the word out sarcastically in deference to my avoiding the question.

“Ok. I'm heading out. I'll see you tonight.” I stood up but before I headed out, I leaned down and stole a quick kiss from Molly which drew a surprised “oh” and a happy grin that I don't think I was supposed to see. I enjoyed it nonetheless.

The day both drug by and went by way too fast. Before I felt ready, 8:00 rolled around. I had changed into dark blue jeans and a black t-shirt with boots and drove to Molly's place in a borrowed vintage pickup truck. I pulled up to the building and Molly strolled out and even in casual wear, she looked stunning with tight blue jeans, tennis shoes and a white tank top with a black jacket and her long blonde hair left loose around her face. I might have been drooling a bit but I still managed to get out and open the passenger door before she got there with a gallant, exaggerated sweep of my arm. She nodded regally in acknowledgement with a gleam of laughter in her eyes as she hopped up into her seat. I walked back around to the driver's side while taking a couple deep breaths to calm the jitters in the bottom of my stomach. I got in and started the truck then grinned over at her and said, “You ready?” She smiled back and nodded.

After about 30 minutes, we got to our destination. I pulled into the drive in theater and Molly grinned. “A drive in? Old school. I like it.” I went and bought the tickets, large popcorn and a couple of drinks and then found a spot and backed the truck up into it. Molly gave me a puzzled look but I opened the door and headed out to drop the tailgate. She understood and lit up when she saw the pillows and blankets I had packed. We got them spread out and climbed up in the back with our popcorn and drinks. I leaned back against the stack of pillows and moved one arm out in invitation. She got it and moved kind of shyly over to lean her head against my chest and throw an arm over my stomach.

For the first minute of the previews, Molly leaned against me but I could feel the tension in her. "Since this is our first official date, we need to get some important questions out of the way." I informed her seriously. I felt her tense up a bit more. She didn't look up but answered "OK, what questions would that be?" "Marvel or DC?" I asked. She looked up in disbelief. "Really Harry?" "Of course, this is a make or break sort of thing. I need to know before we move any further." I felt her relax and was relieved to see the smile back on her face. "You nerd. Marvel for sure." I looked down at her in mock horror. "Ok, date is off. I can't be seen with someone with such poor judgment." She laughed in response like I had hoped she would. I followed up still acting serious for her benefit and asked, "You have one chance to redeem yourself. Whose side are you on for Civil War? Please get this right or it's going to be an awkward drive home." She sat up and playfully pushed my arm. "Speaking of poor judgement, I obviously didn't realize I was going out with such a weirdo. I may have to reconsider all of this." I made a comically exaggerated face of offense which made her giggle. "Madam I believe you're avoiding the question. Captain America or Iron Man?" She pretended to mull it over and tapped her finger against her lips. "Iron Man but only because he's rich and that's the sort of guy I go for." I dropped the charade and laughed at her answer. With the tension broken, she settled back against me and we casually talked superheroes before the start of the movie. I could only figure that her initial tension was that she still had issues believing that I wasn't going to sit up and push her off me and tell her that this was never going to happen. I hated myself a little for making someone so beautiful and kind doubt herself and her welcome around me. All I could really do at this point is stick around and show her that I was serious. So for now while we talked and waited for the movie to start, I wrapped my other arm around her and stroked up and down her back. After a few minutes, any remaining tension eased out of her which meant that she melted all of those delicious curves against the side of my body and casually got readjusted so that her leg was thrown over mine. At this show of affection, I leaned down and kissed the top of her head. I could feel her smile against my chest and the first half of the movie went smoothly.

About halfway through the film at a very intense and very cheesy action chase, I could feel Molly's hand start to wander. First it was just her drawing designs with her fingers over my chest but then her hand kept drifting lower and ended up right around my belt buckle. That definitely caught my attention but I maintained a relaxed hold on her while she explored. Once she saw that she had gotten a rise out of me, literally in this case, she looked up and gave me a cocky half grin. "What do you think you're doing Miss Carpenter?" I asked lightly. She feigned innocence and said "I'm just watching the movie. What are you doing?".

In response, since she was already half on top of me, I grabbed her hips and pulled her fully over me so that she straddled my lap. The abrupt move drew a gasp out of her but she didn't have time to do more as I reached up and grasped the nape of her neck and drew her mouth down to meet mine. I caught her lips as they were still open in shock and my tongue met hers. I could handle slow and teasing up to a certain point but the years of repression can only build up so much before some of it seeps through. This kiss was a release of some of that desire but soon the thrust of my tongue against hers and the hard press of our lips together just wasn't close enough anymore. I slid my hands underneath the jacket and tank top to find the hot, bare flesh of her back and hips. My hands roamed over all of her flesh that was available to me, it wasn't enough but for now, it would have to be.

Even though I was nearly feral with the need for her, I still retained some grasp of our surroundings and the need for some discretion. The time and place still wasn't right for this but I needed her against me. So I gripped her hips and pulled her down so my erection was pressed up against the seam of her jeans. Our lips drew apart as I groaned at the contact and she let out a quiet moan at the feel of me against her. My hand was still at her neck so I gripped a handful of her hair and gently but firmly pulled her face a couple inches away from mine. "Molly?" Her eyes half opened and they were unfocused but I wanted to see her reactions for just a moment before I got lost in her again. Her hands came up to wrap around my neck and tried to pull me closer to bring our lips back together but I tightened my hand in her hair in answer. She let out a soft sound of protest at not being able to do what she wanted but she didn't try it again.

“Molly...” I trailed off to see if she was paying attention. She hummed a soft sound of acknowledgement.

“I want you to grind against me. I want to watch you cum but you're in control of this right now. You can stop whenever you like. Ok?” I wanted to watch her get herself off against me. I had no plans to finish myself until we were back at the apartment but this release, even though it was hers, was enough to satiate me until that time. I knew we were still in public but everyone was watching the movie and in their separate vehicles. I figured it was private enough and the somewhat public venue added a bit of additional thrill to the experience. Her eyes popped open in surprise at the request and a breathless "Oh" escaped her at the realization of the situation but before she could pull herself fully out of the moment, I brought her mouth back down to mine. It took a second but she melted right back into the kiss. In another minute, I felt her experimentally rock against me and moan low in her throat at the contact. "Good. Just like that. You feel so damn good." 

It didn't take long before she lost herself in the pleasure she was feeling and she began to press herself harder against me and the pressure was torture. The feel of her and the stimulation was almost too much to take but I tightened my will and enjoyed the moment. I pulled my mouth away from hers and we were both panting from the exertion. My hands had settled on her ass in her tight blue jeans and I just watched her for a second. She looked... glorious. Her long blonde hair was a mess from my hands gripping it. Her eyes were closed in focus and her delicious mouth was swollen and wet from our kisses. It was amazing to be able to watch her lose herself in the pleasure of the moment.

I wasn't able to keep my mouth off of her for much longer and I brought my mouth to kiss and suck on her neck and up to her ear. She moaned at the added sensation and rocked a little faster. Her breathing got more shallow and it seemed like she was close to coming. She moaned my name and the sound of her voice, heavy with desire and saying my name drove me just a little crazy. I bit the tempting piece of skin where her neck and shoulder met and bucked my hips up into her. That last bit of stimulation pushed her over the edge and her legs tensed around mine as she threw back her head and rode out the feeling.

I couldn't restrain myself from pushing up into her a few more times and she whimpered at the intensity while she was still sensitive. I managed to grit my teeth and still myself when she dropped bonelessly against me and laid her head drowsily on my neck with her arms wrapped around my shoulders. I breathed deeply and calmed myself and focused on enjoying the experience of being able to play a part in pleasing this gorgeous woman. I stroked my hands up and down her back over her jacket and smoothed down her hair while she came down from the high she was on. After a few minutes, she pressed her lips to my neck and murmured, “Mmmm, thanks.”

I couldn't help but smile a bit at that. She raised her head up and saw it and smiled lazily in return. I could see the moment when she realized that we were still at an outdoor drive in. She went from drowsy to wide eyed in just a few seconds.

“Oh my god, Harry! We... we're...” she started a few sentences and just kept darting glances at the vehicles around us.

I laughed and pulled her in for an affectionate kiss. “It's ok. Everybody's watching the movie. Well, they were. The credits are on now but it doesn't look like anyone noticed.” She still looked a little uncertain but after a few seconds, she relaxed a bit and sheepishly smiled at me.

“Well Harry, that was definitely not what I expected from our first date but I can't wait to see what you have planned for the rest of it.”

 


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where the 2nd part of their 1st date doesn't go nearly as well.

Now that the movie was over, Molly and I worked on getting the back of the truck situated to where we could head out for the rest of the night I had planned. It took a little longer than it should have because my hands kept wandering whenever Molly would bend over to pick something up. She didn't seem to mind too much. Once we got everything situated, I opened the door for her to hop in and before I closed it I leaned over to steal a quick kiss which earned me a bright grin. If that bit of casual affection was all it took to get that look of happiness back on her face, then I was about to become a big fan of public displays of affection. I got the truck started and Molly scooted over closer before we took off for the restaurant.

Once we reached the city, Molly asked, “So where are we headed now?” “To Mac's to get some food. I figured you might have worked up an appetite.” I waggled my eyebrows suggestively at that. Even though she knew I was joking, she still turned a little pink but didn't deny it. I laughed. This was working out to be one of the better dates that I had ever been on and the night wasn't even over yet.

When we got to Mac's, I opened the door and let her go in first then stooped a bit to avoid hitting my head on the fans or door frames. I smiled and waved at Mac. “Hey, thanks for doing this for me.”

He grunted in response and gestured to the table over in the corner. The place was empty and everything was cleared off except for the one table which had a table cloth, candle and white rose on it. It may have been corny but it was familiar ground for both of us and would hopefully stave off some of the stilted first date awkwardness. I had been able to set this up due in part to my frequent patronage of the establishment but perhaps the larger part was that I had finally been able to settle my long standing tab thanks to the various jobs I found myself doing. Between the Wardens, some PI work and some income from the Winter Knight gig, I had more money than I had ever earned previously. Granted I still wasn't well off but compared to some of my previous situations, I was practically wealthy.

Molly saw the table and grinned at the setup. She knew me well enough to appreciate the gesture for what it was: an attempt to make things romantic but still within our comfort zones. I got to the table before her and pulled out her chair and gestured with a fake French accent, “Madame.”

She shook her head at the theatrics and settled down into the chair. When we were both settled, Mac brought over 2 beers and 2 steaks with french fries then left the restaurant. While it was against his normal policy to bring food to the table, he made a one time exception when I practically begged him to help me make this happen. I had agreed to clean up the dishes before I left.

“So... what did you think of the movie?” I asked when there was starting to be a bit of an awkward silence. She looked up from her food and grinned, “There was a movie?” I laughed at that response. Conversation flowed well after that especially since Molly had several more beers with her food. I stuck with the one since I had to drive home. When we were done, I quickly washed up the dishes and then presented her with the rose before we left for the night. The drive home was a bit of a blur because my mind was focused on nothing except what could happen once we got home.

As soon as we got in the door and had it closed and locked behind us, Molly spun around and pushed me up against the closed door. My eyes widened in surprise at the sudden ferocity but I was soon distracted with Molly pressed firmly against me and kissing her way up my neck to my mouth. I bent down to meet her lips and quickly got swept up in her enthusiasm. Before I realized it, her jacket and tank top were on the floor and my shirt had quickly joined them. That left us both in jeans and shoes and her with her bra still on. This had escalated faster than I had anticipated and I pulled away from her kiss to clear my head and tried to regain some blood flow back to my brain. She did not seem pleased with that idea and made a sound of protest and tried to pull me back down for more.

“Molly, we need to slow down.” My voice sounded lower and gravelier than I had intended.

“No.” she said firmly.

My eyes flashed a bit at the defiance that I heard in her tone. “I said we need to slow down, so we're going to slow down.”

“Dammit Harry! Why can't we just finish this and get it out of the way.” she argued. She had taken a step back and ran her fingers through her hair in agitation.

I stepped farther into the room and sat on the back of one of the couches and crossed my arms over my bare chest. “Care to explain what you mean by that.” I asked with a hint of challenge in my voice. Her answer would determine the course that the night would take.

She huffed out a breath in exasperation. “You know damn well that I have waited years for this. Just because you're just now catching up doesn't mean that we need to slow down. The build up is killing me and I just want to do this before you change your mind.”

I felt my eyes narrow at her response. “Have I given you any indication that I don't want to go through with this?” I questioned.

“Not yet.” she snapped back. “Doesn't mean you won't.”

I was taken aback by the turn that this had all taken and couldn't quite place my finger on what the issue was. It was obvious what she was saying was an issue but it wasn't the primary issue right now. I sat on the back of the couch for a minute longer and let the silence stretch out to see if she would be more forthcoming with her answers. The sullen look on her face said that nothing would. It was then I started to put it together.

“Molly, how many drinks did you have at dinner?”

She glared at me “What are you trying to say? That I'm drunk? Really?”

“Yea, it's starting to look that way. How many?”

“A few. It doesn't matter.” she said defensively.

“How many is a few? Tell me.” I prompted. I asked all of this quietly and calmly but I was seeing the bigger picture more clearly.

“Like 6. Why does it matter?”

“You don't ever drink that much any more. Why did you tonight?” I was hoping that she would give me the actual answers to these questions instead of brushing it off. She just crossed her arms over her bra and stared straight ahead. I went around to sit on the sofa instead of the back of it and beckoned her over. “Come sit with me Molls, please?”

She huffed a bit but came over and sat on the other end of the couch with her arms still crossed over chest. I sat facing her and asked, “Can I tell you what I think?” She shrugged but looked straight ahead. I continued “You told me once that it would take time before you could let someone touch you again. You've been pretty comfortable with everything we've done so far but this is more than that. And you're right there's been a lot of build up to this point so it looks even more daunting. So to calm down and take your mind off of the pressure, you drank. Is that pretty close?”

As I spelled out my theory, Molly's arms went from looking like a defensive posture to looking closer to her holding herself together. Her head drooped a bit and she nodded. “Wanna tell me more about it?” I asked carefully.

“Not really.” she answered quietly.

“That's fine but until you're sober and we're on the same page, we're stopping here.” She glanced quickly up at me. I hurriedly added, “I don't mean that unless you tell me then I'm leaving. I just mean that until I understand what I can do to not make things worse for you, I'm not going to do anything more than what we have done so far. Ok?”

She nodded but had looked back down. It was heartbreaking to see my beautiful Molly this vulnerable and hurt. I scooted down to her end of the couch and asked, “Is it ok if I hold you right now?” She nodded again so I picked her up onto my lap and held her against me. I could feel the tension slowly give way to sleep so I sat there a minute more before standing up and carrying her to my room. I tucked her into bed after taking off her boots and debated on the rest of her clothing. I didn't want to make things worse in the morning so I left her sleeping in a bra and jeans and then went to get aspirin and water to set on the bedside table in case she needed them in the morning then got into bed beside her being careful not to disturb her. This wasn't how I had anticipated the night ending but now that I had decided to try and make this work, I was going to do my best to not screw this up if I could help it.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, the fanfic muses deserted me for awhile but I couldn't leave this unresolved. I read over the comments that were left and tried to take them and improve what I had previously written so I went back and edited the 1st 7 chapters. I think they flow a little better and chapter 7, I feel definitely benefitted from ya'lls comments. So please keep them coming. :) 
> 
> Also I had fully intended on Molly and Harry finally getting to hook up but feelings/ issues arose.


	9. Chapter 9

With Molly asleep and my brain wired and worried, I decided to take the time and think through how to proceed. I had figured that my coming around to the idea of Molly and I getting together would be the biggest hurdle we would face but it was looking like the amount of time that I took to get there and the events that occurred between would be an even bigger one. Both of us were on board with the idea of us being together so now we needed to figure out how to overcome the obstacles that were already appearing in our paths.

  
Obstacle one: trust issues resulting from years of rejection and failed relationships.

  
Obstacle two: residual mental issues from some seriously fucked up shit that seemed to come along with being a wizard.

  
Obstacle three: communication. We both kind of sucked at being transparent with what we were thinking and feeling.

  
So how to deal with all of this? The idea that my brain kept coming back to was our mentor/ student relationship. We had set up guidelines about what was acceptable or off limits, had an idea of the progression that would take place and allowed for open dialogue and questions. I think that part of the problem was that we had tried to approach ours as a normal relationship and it wasn't. The dynamic we had before had worked for what we were trying to accomplish so who's to say that it wouldn't work now as well? The only differences being the subject matter and that in this regards, we would both be students learning what worked or didn't for the other person.

  
The more I thought about, the better the idea seemed. The issue now was convincing Molly who had only recently progressed beyond the role of being a student, I didn't imagine she would be too excited about the idea of moving back to that role. I just had to make her see that she would be as much of a teacher as I would. With that solution calming my thoughts and feeling slightly smug over my solution, I got in bed with Molly with the intention of getting a peaceful night sleep beside her and talking it all over in the morning. Once I got settled in, I wrapped an arm over her side and things went downhill from there.

  
As soon as my arm touched her side, Molly's arms flew out and a wave of power threw me back away from her, off the bed and onto floor several feet away where I landed roughly on my back. All of my breath whooshed out in a gust and I lay there stunned for a moment until I saw a light building from where Molly lay and hurriedly threw up a shield just as the blast hit and splintered the shield on impact. I let out a yell of surprise and heard a gasp in response to the sound.

Molly sat up panting and wild eyed in confusion then scuttered to put her back to the wall, scanning the room frantically to see where the danger was. Her eyes finally found me propped up on the floor and asked in a rush “Harry? What happened? How did you get on the floor? Are you ok?”

  
When she finished the quick deluge of questions, she crawled off the bed and got down beside me on the floor and started to check me over for injuries. “How did something get in here and attack? I didn't think that was possible.”

I could tell that she hadn't put all of the pieces together yet and I was still regaining my breath so I sat for a moment more while her hands moved quickly over me to make sure there was no blood or anything sticking out I guess.

As she thought it through, her hands slowed and then stopped and she retreated back a step with a horrified look dawning on her face. “I... I didn't... no, I couldn't. I didn't do this, did I?”

She looked so appalled at the thought that I quickly reached out to comfort her saying, “It's ok. You were asleep. You couldn't help it. I'm ok.” None of that seemed to calm her down especially when she saw the twinge of pain on my face from sitting up so fast.

  
“Harry, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Are you hurt? Is it your back? Your head?” While she was concerned and still running high on adrenaline from the outburst and panic, she was staying just out of reach so that I couldn't touch her and try to comfort her. I wanted nothing more than to wrap her in a hug and convince her that everything was ok but I could not only see, but feel, her retreating from me.

However since I could sit up and talk, she stood and said “I'm going to call Butters to check you out. Just in case, you know. Your back might be hurt again. Or something else could have happened. Who knows what I might have done...” She was retreating back towards the door and rambling but I didn't need Butters and she knew it but needed a reason to leave.

  
“Molly, I'm fine. Nothing is broken, see?” I stood gingerly while saying that and held my arms out in a ta-dah sort of gesture. “I got worse from physical therapy. No big deal, you were asleep and I must have startled you.” I said all of this in a calming voice, the kind you would use to ease the fear of a stray or a hurt child because at this moment she wasn't thinking logically but was running on emotions.

I eased towards her a few steps and she tensed up but allowed it. I got close enough to take her hands and could feel them shaking. “Hey, it's ok. Can I hug you right now?” I looked closely at her face and saw the panic flash briefly across it before she stoically buried it and nodded her head. I tilted my head in an appraising glance and told her in a low tone, “It's ok if it's not. I know it's been a rough day and there's been a lot of emotions. Tell me honestly is it ok if I hug you right now?”

  
With that last bit, I saw tears well in her eyes and her retreat into herself, shaking her head and pulling her hands from mine to wrap them tightly across her stomach. Ouch. I knew it wasn't necessarily me but it hurt to see her this vulnerable and know that I physically couldn't comfort her without making things worse. This wasn't about me at the moment though, this was about her and getting her through tonight. Instead I gently asked “Do you want to go sit on the couch and I can bring you a cup of tea?”

She nodded her head gratefully and a couple of the tears that had welled up spilled down her face. She hurriedly wiped them away and walked to the couch where she sat in the corner with her legs pulled tightly up to her chest and arms wrapped around them making herself as small as possible. She stared blankly ahead and took deep breaths. The only thing I could do now was give her the space to pull herself back together so I went to the kitchen and made a pot of tea.

  
When I brought a cup of it out to her about ten minutes later, some of the tension had leaked out of her shoulders and she gave me a halfhearted smile of thanks. I sat on the opposite end of the couch and realized that we were almost back to where we had started physically when she initially asked to sleep with me but so much had happened already. Now that I had let myself acknowledge what I felt for her, there was no going back and I could only hope that we could be strong enough to work through whatever came up.

After a few moments sitting in silence, I started out with “ So.... are you ok?”

She glanced up, startled. “Am I ok? I wasn't the one that got thrown to the floor and attacked. Or the one that got ice manacled to a wall and molested. I keep hurting you. I can't keep hurting you, Harry.”

“Hey, I would tell you if you had hurt me...”

She interrupted me with an icy glare saying “No, you wouldn't. You wouldn't want to make me feel bad so even if I did hurt you, you wouldn't tell me.” She had a bit of spark in her eye at this argument so I could tell that she felt strongly about this particular issue.

I conceded “Maybe I wouldn't but you didn't hurt me. And me not telling you things, I think, is one of the reasons that you keep subconsciously attacking me. You would never knowingly physically hurt me but some part of you is trying to protect yourself from me hurting you. I've hurt you so many times over the years emotionally that part of you is pushing back.”

She gaped at me in disbelief. “You're rationalizing the fact that I keep hurting you by blaming yourself? Seriously? You're the victim here. I got my feelings hurt and you got blown to the floor. That isn't right.”

I sighed, “I'm not blaming myself. I'm just saying from personal experience that repressing emotions in magic users can manifest as physical magic. What I'm trying to get at is that we both need to be more open with each other before rushing into a physical relationship We both got caught up in the lust part of things that we didn't pay attention to the feelings aspect of it. From now on, we aren't going to advance the physical side of things until we have worked through some of our other issues first”

“Why does it sound like you're proposing couples therapy?”

I chuckled briefly at the question. “I guess that's not far off but what I had in mind was more towards our previous mentor relationship.”

Molly looked appalled at the thought and opened her mouth to protest but I held up a hand to cut off her response. “Hold on, not exactly like it was obviously but that dynamic worked for us so I was thinking we could apply it to this except we will both be teaching the other. It will let us set up rules for the other on how to not get in trouble. Better yet it will let us complete one lesson and then move onto the next once the other is... satisfied.” I gave a half smirk at that so that she caught the innuendo and could see that this wouldn't just be talking about feelings. Which admittedly I wasn't great at it but I was willing to give it a shot to be with her after all that she had done for me over the years.

“Oh really?” she inquired with a quirked eyebrow and a hint of her normal impudence coming back.

“Oh yes, there's all sorts of fun lessons that I had in mind. What do you think grasshopper? Want to mentor each other?” I grinned at the cheesiness of the setup but if that's what it took to get her mind off of things then I had no problems with it.

She tilted her head considering the question then solemnly nodded. “Yes, teach you the ways of things I will.” I laughed at the Yoda impression and she gave a small smile.

“We can work on the everything else in the morning. For now, do you want to watch a movie with me?” She smiled, nodded and stretched out on the couch, still not touching but closer to me. I smiled in return and got up to put a Disney movie in and settled back in, content to have gotten things somewhat back between the two of us and just enjoyed being around her for the night.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> IDK how I feel about this but I figure they could get everything out on the table all at once without all of the hand twisting awkwardness that usually occurs around these conversations. Also the potion thing may have had a slight aphrodisiac edge to it that provided some mild distraction. However I think the chapters going forward will be on the lessons because while I'm relistening to the books, I just want Harry to get some action and be happy. 
> 
> Feel free to leave feedback and hopefully I will putting out more chapters soon. :)

 

The next morning I woke up alone on the couch and, still groggy, slightly befuddled as to how I had gotten there. Last night's events creeped back in as I slowly gained some level of consciousness. Coffee was needed for any additional processing however so I headed to the kitchen and was pleasantly surprised to see a fresh pot steaming and ready. I fixed myself a mug and felt all of the pieces from last night come back. Today was the start of attempting a new dynamic with Molly and trying to mend a whole lot of messed up on both of our parts. I considered how to approach the situation while sipping coffee and wondering what sort of state Molly would be in after last night.

I didn't have too long to wait as she came walking out of the bedroom dressed in ripped blue jeans and a horror movie tee with bare feet and wet hair. She looked pretty adorable to be honest but also disturbingly young. At least to me, she looked too young with that fake bravado of teenagers that says everything is perfectly ok when they are barely holding it together. I'm all too aware that she isn't a teenager but the outfit and the vulnerability just reminds me so much of the start of her apprenticeship with me that it almost physically painful.

Me giving into this was a choice I thought would make us both happy, especially since, according to Molly, she has wanted this for so long. Instead every step forward we manage to stumble through throws one or both of us further back in some aspect or another.

However instead of conveying any of my concerns, I gave her an easy smile. "Thanks for the coffee. Evidently I needed it to remember why I was asleep on the couch. How are you feeling this morning?"

She smiled in acknowledgment and if it was a little forced around the edges, I pretended not to see. "Good. Much better. Thanks."

Ok... this was definitely not a great start to our communication progressing. Instead of letting it slide, I pressed the issue just a bit. "Sure, now why don't you try giving the answer to someone who knows you a lot better than that. I know last night was rough but how are you?”

She grimaced slightly at me for calling her bluff and looked down. “Better. Not great.”

At her obvious discomfort, an idea came to me that I normally wouldn't consider but as a one time deal I thought might work.

“I've got an idea. Give me an hour or two then we can have lunch and maybe talk some. Does that sound ok to you?”

She looked confused but nodded warily. I gave her a reassuring smile then headed to the lab that Molly had set up for me. I used the land line that was in there to call and order pizza for when I was finished. I figured that the major issue that was hindering our communication was getting comfortable saying what we were feeling. We had both been repressing everything for so long that it felt somehow wrong to come out and talk about our pasts and feelings. So to get the ball rolling I figured I would improvise a sort of comfort potion. Some people look to alcohol for liquid courage, I figured for this one time I could use some magical help to try and rectify the aftermath of years of dealing with supernatural bullshit.

For the base of the potion, I used a glass of wine. For taste, a square of chocolate. For feel, a piece of terry cloth robe. For sight, a landscape photo. For smell, the scent of chocolate chip cookies fresh out of the oven. For sound, a snippet of classical music. A couple of torn up pages from Pride and Prejudice for the mind and some warm sunshine for the soul. After imbuing a bit of my will into the potion, I left it to simmer for a bit and went out to pay for the pizza and bring it back in past all of the wards. Molly was nowhere to be seen when I came back in so I left the pizza on the table and put the potion into 2 glasses.

Once I got back out the table, I called for Molly. It took a minute but she peeked her head out of the office that was set up down the hall. I have no idea what she could be doing in there but at the moment, I was too nervous about this plan to worry about it. She joined me at the table and smiled when she saw the Pizza Express box.

“Good choice,” she commented.

“I thought so.” I pulled out a chair and motioned for her to sit which earned me a bemused expression before she sat. I sat on the chair next to her and directed my body and attention in her direction.

“So about this idea of yours...” she ventured.

“My idea is in these glasses. I brewed us a couple of glasses of liquid comfort.”

“So alcohol then? Didn't you just advise me recently that getting intoxicated was not the way to go here?” Molly glanced skeptically at the liquid in the glasses.

“No, not alcohol. I improvised a potion that will hopefully put us more at ease and open to talking. If you don't want to, there's no pressure. I just thought it might make the difficult stuff a bit easier to talk about.” Her expression turned considering as she thought it over.

“What did you want to cover first?”

“I was thinking limits and triggers. It would be best to get those out of the way before anything else so that we don't accidentally upset the other person while trying something new. Thoughts?”

She nodded slowly and asked “What else?”

I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Concerns or reservations that either of us have about moving forward.” She glanced up sharply at that.

I held my hands up in an appeasing gesture. “Every person has doubts about what is going to happen. I figured we get them out in the open. Once all of the hard stuff is over though, I was thinking we could have our first lesson if you're feeling up to teaching me.” I offered her a crooked smile to hopefully ease any apprehension she might have about what all was to come.

She still looked mildly taken aback by all that I was proposing but just shook her head, grabbed one of the glasses and lifted it. “Screw it. Cheers?”

I smiled at her approach, grabbed the other glass and tapped it to hers. “Cheers.”

We downed our glasses and each enjoyed several slices of pizza. By the time we were done, I was feeling warm and relaxed and content. I stood and offered Molly my hand. She smiled up at me and took it and I led us both over to the couch where I proceeded to lean back against one of the arms of the couch with my legs spread out on the cushions. Molly settled her back against my chest and I wrapped my arms around her middle with my chin resting gently on her shoulder. She placed her hands over mine and snuggled down into me.

“Ok where to start...” Evidently some part of me thought that kissing the side of Molly's neck would be a good place to start. Another part agreed but also intoned that there were conversations to be had.

Thankfully Molly could multitask. She turned her head slightly to one side so that I had better access but then said “Limits? You first.”

I smiled gently against her neck and said “Ah yes. Well I don't like being in the dark or being restrained. Vampires kind of ruined those for me. Not a big fan of super soft beds that sink in any more. Thank Mab's physical therapy for that. Yours is great. I like your bed. I think because you're in it. Neck bites are not my favorite thing. Again vampires ruin all of the fun things. You have a very biteable neck. Did you know that?”

To demonstrate, I playfully nipped at the tendon on the side of her neck and then ran my tongue over it. She shivered slightly against me. I liked that reaction so I did it again.

“Anything else?” she prompted.

“Not that I can think of right now. What about you?” I continued to nuzzle gently against the side of her neck and kissed up to her ear. She raised her shoulder and giggled a bit when I ended up kissing and nibbling along her ear.

“That tickles.” I smiled and stopped doing it so that she could talk. “Well I don't like being touched unexpectedly and being alone in the dark isn't great. It's fine with you there. I don't like being scratched. I can't think of much else right now.” I squeezed my arms briefly around her to let her know that I was there for support if she needed it. “Can we get to lessons now?”

“Patience grasshopper. What concerns do you have about this between us?”

Even with the comfort potion, she tensed slightly at that question.

“It's ok. Say what you honestly think. I can take it.” She glanced back at me and I nodded encouragingly. She faced back forwards and let the tension ease out of her.

“I worry that you're going to change your mind. Or that this was all an elaborate trick from Lea as part of my training. Or that Mab is going to use us against each other.” Now that she had gotten started, the doubts poured out of her like a dam that had just broken under all of the weight and stress that it had been shoring up for too long. “Or that my parents will be upset. That I might physically hurt you or that you might emotionally scar me. That I am just the consolation prize since things haven't worked out with you and your past girlfriends. That this is just gratitude for providing a place to live or pity that I've been pining over you or company because you've been isolated on Demonreach. That maybe you finally gave in because of our mantles. I just worry...”

With that she trailed off and looked back at me. My arms had evidently tightened reflexively around her and my mouth was slightly agape in surprise. I had known that there would be doubts but I hadn't known just how deep her's would run. I composed myself once I saw her looking. I could not even imagine how much worse this would be for both of us without the aid of the potion that I had brewed. Then again neither of us would have been this open and all of this would have boiled under the surface until a breaking point was reached over all of the insecurities that we both had. She glanced away but I turned her face back gently to mine and pressed a light kiss to her lips to let her know that everything was still ok and that I was there regardless.

“Well you already know most of mine but I'll list them anyways. I just wonder if you're still too young for me or exaggerating what you feel based on a childhood crush. I worry that it will disappoint your parents that I started as your mentor but we ended up together. I worry about the Winter connection too sometimes but I was attracted to you before that. I worry that I'll make you a target for my enemies. I worry about our combined inexperience with relationships thanks to all the wizarding restrictions. Most of all, I worry that I'll lose your friendship if this all goes to hell. I need you in my life and I don't want to fuck this all up.”

Now it was her turn to face me and place a small kiss on my lips as reassurance. “We're quite a pair, aren't we Harry?” She smiled gently as she asked the question.

I let out a little laugh. “That we are.”

Her smile turned wicked around the edges as she asked, “So what's the first lesson?”

“Well that would be up to you Ms. Carpenter. You're the teacher today and I'm here to learn all about how you like to be kissed and touched with clothes still on and without going past 1st base.”

She grinned in anticipation and said as seriously as she could manage. “Well Mr. Dresden then class is in session.”

With no hesitation and with a whole lot of enthusiasm, Molly pushed herself up off the couch and offered her hand to me with a wicked smile. I returned it in kind, took her hand and let her lead me to the bedroom.

 


	11. Chapter 11

That night and the next couple of weeks that followed were a roller coaster of emotions and new experiences. We took the time to get to know each other in a whole new light. She liked it when I surprised her with kisses and affection, but wasn't comfortable with being hugged from behind. She tended to take the soft kisses we shared to a heated level rather quickly but could calm down into lazy cuddles a lot faster than I could.

She was a cuddly, cheerful morning person whereas I could barely function before coffee. She got around that fact quickly though by finding new and extremely pleasant ways to wake me up.

Some mornings I would wake up to Molly running her fingers through my hair or stroking her fingers up and down my back. Once we got past past more... intimate lessons, there were several mornings I would wake up arching up into Molly's tight grip on my hardness. She had checked beforehand in one of our many conversations that revolved around our lessons that touching me while I was still asleep was ok. I had hastily agreed with an eagerness that made her laugh.

We both still tended to repress when things bothered us. There were several days when Molly would come home from dealing with the Winter Court where she would put a smile on her face and act as if everything were normal and ok. When I would go to hug her, there was a tenseness to her that let me know that she would need a little time and extra care. I gave her space when it seemed like she needed it and extra affection when it seemed like that would help. I occasionally withdrew into my thoughts and found myself brooding. She provided the same consideration to me that I did for her and helped when she could and gave me space when she couldn't.

Our lessons provided a great distraction from the outside world and let us focus on each other for a time. I honestly couldn't decide if I liked the days when I was the mentor or the student the best. On the one hand, being touched in a gentle or sexual way was a novelty all on it's own but being able to touch Molly in return in just the ways she liked was a high by itself. Over time I had come to know the spots on her body where she liked the most attention. Her neck with it's elegant curve and her strong shoulders were some of her (and my) favorite places to shower kisses and little bites and when I did, she melted into me. When I massaged my fingers through her hair and on her scalp, I got to enjoy the decadent moans that she let out. Having my mouth on her nipples and the silver bars that were thankfully still there caused her to arch up into me and grip my head tight to her.

My favorite thing to do though was to snake my hand slowly over her stomach and down to where these lessons left her wet for me. Then I could tease her gently with my fingers while my lips, tongue and teeth were roaming over the rest of her. Only when she got to the point where she was writhing under me and whimpering with a helpless need would I slide down her body and trail kisses along the way until I came to the wet heat of her. I would place soft kisses along her inner thighs and let my fingers sink into her until I located that spot that would drive her wild. I could set up a fast pace with my fingers and then start using my tongue and lips on her sensitive clitoris. Watching her body undulating with the pleasure until she reached her climax was intoxicating. Seeing her sink into a satisfied puddle after the fact was equally as rewarding.

We took our time and built up to each new step of physical intimacy while still focusing on the emotional side as well. Each time one of us was the teacher, the physical attention for the night was on that person and the student got to ask questions about the physical or emotional side of things. Sometimes the questions were as simple as “Do you like it when I do that?” or as difficult as “Would you still want me if...?”.

We were saving the news of our relationship to tell those closest to us until after we had built up enough trust in ourselves and in each other that we wouldn't mess this up. After a couple days of deciding when that would be, it was decided that once we had gotten around to having sex then we could feel pretty safely about the situation. So despite the fact that it had been a couple of weeks, we were still building up to that particular milestone.

 

Tonight I was taking a break from lessons and just enjoyed surprising Molly with something fun. I had set it up while she was gone for the day and I was really hoping that she liked it as much as I thought she might. We were in downtown Chicago next to a lumber yard and I hadn't given her any clues as to where we might be headed.

“Mind if I blindfold you so I don't ruin the surprise?” I asked, holding up a black bandanna.

“I like where this is going already,” she said, grinning impishly and waggling her eyebrows at me. I snorted.

“Get your mind out of the gutter and put this on. Then you get a piggyback ride and everything.” She did as I asked. She locked her arms around my shoulders and I settled my grip under her knees. “No peeking.”

“Aye aye Captain.”

“Smartass.” I muttered. With her face against my shoulder, I could feel the smile on her lips and my lips quirked up in response. I gathered my will in and quietly murmured “Aparturum.” With that, I walked through the Way that had been created and closed it behind me. Once I oriented myself, I recalled the directions my mother's memories had provided. Thankfully it was only about a 5 minute hike through Winter's territory and one of the nicer places at that. Once I got to the giant tree that the memories had indicated, I opened a Way to where we were going. I stepped through into crisp autumn air and a cool mountain breeze.

I felt Molly take a big breath in and sniff at the air and furrow her brows in confusion. “Harry, where are we?”

“This is where I hide the bodies.” I deadpanned. She hesitated for a second and then decided I was kidding. She kicked her leg against my thigh in revenge. Not enough to hurt but enough to convey annoyance. “It's a surprise. Give me a few more minutes.”

She huffed out a breath. “Fine, but hurry or I start peeking.” She wasn't kidding. Trying to surprise her was an exercise in subterfuge. You try hiding emotional and physical clues from your empath girlfriend and tell me how easy it is.

Once I caught my first glimpse at the cabin, I was struck by how nice it was. Having connections with the Sidhe is nice sometimes. “Ok, hop down.” I let go of her legs and let her weight slide down to land on her feet. She kept her hand braced on my shoulder for reference. “And now you can take the blindfold off.”

I heard her small gasp and grinned. “Harry! Oh my god!”

“Well that's something I never mind hearing...” I commented. She ignored me and took in where we were. I had been owed a favor and called it in for the use of a two bedroom cabin in the mountains of Colorado. I was expecting a modest sized retreat in nature and was instead confronted with a wonder of glass and wood perched facing the edge of a mountain. There were no other people or houses to be seen any where around the area and the fire pit in front of the cabin still had the blaze going that I had set earlier.

I laced my fingers with Molly's and tugged her with me towards the fire. I had arranged a cooler and basket beside two big Adirondack chairs. I sat down in one and expected her to take the other once she had absorbed the surroundings. Instead she sat down in my lap and wrapped her arms around my neck and leaned her head against mine. “Thank you. This is amazing.”

I huffed out a laugh. “We haven't even been inside yet.”

“I don't care. Thank you for doing this. It's wonderful.” She lifted her head, met my eyes and placed a soft kiss on my lips. I returned it.

“You're welcome. You deserve a vacation and any time I get to spend alone with you is wonderful. The view just happens to be a bonus from here.”

She smiled softly. “So what's the plan?”

I pulled the cooler and basket closer and gestured dramatically. “S'mores!”

Molly giggled. It was adorable. “Does that mean I get to lick white stuff off your fingers?”

I have to say, the girl was great at putting my mind in the gutter but I gasped as if affronted and said indignantly, “Miss Carpenter, that is a highly inappropriate thing to insinuate.”

“I'm taking that as a yes.” I huffed out a laugh and just called her a nympho in response.

She hopped off my lap so that we could everything situated to roast marshmallows and assemble the s'mores. She took over holding the marshmallows over the fire after informing me that even with ice powers I was still entirely too likely to burn things down. I stuck out my tongue at her but let her do it.

She got the first bite and the grin on her face at the simple pleasure of the experience was enough by itself to make the trip worth it. I kissed the sweetness from her lips and stole the rest of her s'mores from her hand. She rolled her eyes at that but went to work on the next one. We made a mess while making and eating them but compensated for that by licking and sucking the melted chocolate from each others skin. It was a pure and simple moment that I knew I would pull from my memories to reflect on in the future to enjoy when things were bad.

Once we had our fill and drank some of the bottled water from the cooler to wash down the sugar high, the sun had almost set and the first bit of stars were coming out. It was a view that living in Chicago didn't provide and I laid out some blankets on the opposite side of the fire from the chairs so that we could lay down and enjoy the view. We still hadn't been in to explore the cabin yet but it was peaceful out here.

Plus it was surprisingly comfortable laying down on the blankets on top of the grass with Molly tucked against my side with her head on my chest and an arm and leg thrown over mine. I was stroking her hair absentmindedly and we were both staring up at the stars and trying to remember what constellation was what and point it out. I was definitely better at it than she was from living on a farm with little else to occupy my attention. When we had exhausted what we knew of the stars and lulled into a comfortable silence. I nudged her gently and said “Ok, let's go in.”

She groaned at the thought of getting up until I told her, “There's supposed to be a huge bathtub in there.” That got her attention and she hopped up and helped me get to my feet. We left things as they were and agreed to straighten it up in the morning.

We started walking to the cabin and Molly turned with a glint in her eye and said “Race ya!” With no more warning than that, she took off at a sprint to cover the last couple hundred feet to the front stairs of the porch. It took a second to register then I grinned and tried to cover the ground between us. I quickly caught up but it was neck and neck racing up the steps. She managed to touch the door a split second before I did and shot me a triumphant look.

“Cheater,” I grumbled jokingly.

“As the winner, I demand that I be carried up to this bath.” I laughed and then promptly tossed her over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes. She whooshed out a breath then smacked her hands against my butt. “You suck.”

I slapped her ass since it was placed so conveniently and told her “You asked for it.” She moaned at the slap and that caused me to raise an eyebrow. Generally we were pretty gentle with each other since neither of us wanted to risk riling the Winter side of our urges and besides we had both been dealt enough pain and roughness to last a lifetime. “Why Miss Carpenter... did you enjoy that?”

I knew her well enough to know that her face was probably red and she mumbled in response. I felt my grin widen and I did it again to her other upturned ass cheek this time, still pretty easy but enough to make some noise on contact. She tried to stifle it this time around but I still heard the hint of a moan. “What was that? I didn't quite hear you.”

“Yes you barbarian, I did.”

“Uggh, me like. Me want more.” I grunted out and by this time we had reached the bedroom with it's attached bath but I ignored that part and tossed her gently onto the bed. During the trip up, neither of us had paid any attention to the amenities. Molly since she was facing my back and me because I was focused on getting her to the bed to talk this over and explore it a bit more. Her face was still red and she attempted to cover her face with her hands but I just crawled up between her legs and hovered over her. I moved her hands away and still smiling, kissed her lips. She returned it grudgingly and just muttered “This isn't the bath.”

“I thought you were supposed to get dirty before you had to take a bath.” I waggled my eyebrows at her in an imitation of the cheesy gesture she had done earlier. She laughed and then just wrapped her legs around my waist which in turn pulled me closer. After a few minutes of being wrapped up in each other, I was forcibly reminded why I stayed so damned paranoid about checking my surroundings.

 


End file.
